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Children’s early understanding of mathematics provides a foundation for later success in school. Identifying ways to enhance mathematical instruction is crucial to understanding the ideal ways to promote academic success. Previous work has identified mathematical language (i.e., the words and concepts related to early mathematical development such as more, same, or similar) as a key mechanism that can be targeted to improve children’s development of early numeracy skills (e.g., counting, cardinality, and addition). Current recommendations suggest a combination of numeracy instruction and quantitative language instruction to promote numeracy skills. However, there is limited direct support of this recommendation. The goal of the proposed study is to compare the unique and combined effects of each type of instruction on children’s numeracy skills in the context of picture book reading. We randomly assigned 234 children (ages 3–5) to one of four conditions where they worked with trained project staff who read picture books targeting: (a) quantitative language only (e.g., more or less), (b) numeracy only (e.g., cardinality, addition), (c) combined [quantitative language + numeracy], or (d) nonnumerical (active control) picture books. Results revealed no significant effects of the quantitative language only or numeracy only conditions, but mixed effects of the combined condition. These findings indicate that more work is needed on how mathematical language and numeracy instruction should best be delivered to preschool children. 

This article synthesizes findings from an international virtual conference, funded by the United States National Science Foundation, focused on the home mathematics environment (HME). In light of inconsistencies and gaps in research investigating relations between the HME and children’s outcomes, the purpose of the conference was to discuss actionable steps and considerations for future work. The conference was composed of international researchers with a wide range of expertise and backgrounds. Presentations and discussions during the conference centered broadly on the need to better operationalize and measure the HME as a construct—focusing on issues related to child, family, and community factors, country and cultural factors, and the cognitive and affective characteristics of caregivers and children. Results of the conference and a subsequent writing workshop include a synthesis of core questions and key considerations for the field of research on the HME. Findings highlight the need for the field at large to use multi-method measurement approaches to capture nuances in the HME, and to do so with increased international and interdisciplinary collaboration, open science practices, and communication among scholars.